More Kangaroo Sightings

Is it possible that kangaroo escapees from the circus could continue to live and thrive in Kentucky's climate over generations? Wouldn't people see these Kentucky kangaroos? Well, some people apparently have.

We've reported here and in Kentucky Monthly on the anomalous kangaroo sightings in Kentucky, circa 1899 and 1974.

Now there's a new report, from Unusual Kentucky reader Erin Kelley Henry, about kangaroos that she and her mother were eyewitnesses to in 2002. On three separate occasions, a kangaroo was seen hopping around residential areas in Richmond.

Anyone else have a kangaroo sighting they've been withholding all these years?

Kentucky Chupacabra?

Now this is news! Mark Cothren, a farmer from Lebanon Junction, KY, has made a shocking announcement: he's killed a Chupacabra in his yard.

What's a Chupacabra? It's a mythical beast that was first posited in 1995 in Puerto Rico, shortly after which alleged sightings swept Mexico, Central America, and South America. Gradually, as happens with all cryptid myths like Mothman, people started reporting it everywhere, even Russia.

Wikipedia describes the commonly shared view of the Chupacabra's appearance (one variant of which is seen in the image above via an artist's model conception):

The most common description of chupacabras is a reptile-like being, appearing to have leathery or scaly greenish-gray skin and sharp spines or quills running down its back. This form stands approximately 3 to 4 feet (1 to 1.2 m) high, and stands and hops in a similar fashion to a kangaroo. In at least one sighting, the creature was reported to hop 20 feet (6 m). This variety is said to have a dog or panther-like nose and face, a forked tongue, and large fangs. It is said to hiss and screech when alarmed, as well as leave behind a sulfuric stench. When it screeches, some reports assert that the chupacabras' eyes glow an unusual red which gives the witnesses nausea.

With that description in mind, let's have a look-see at what Mr. Cothren caught:


Uh... dude. That's it? Really?

What you call "Chupacabra", I call "Chihuahua."

This sighting is part of a new trend in the Chupacabra myth, one in which the traditional description given above is completely ignored, and more and more people are starting to say that Chupacabras can also look like a wild dog. Why? I guess because are catching wild dogs, and wanting to say they caught a Chupacabra, and therefore are retconning an entirely new description onto the concept.

In November 2007, an alleged Chupacabra head was DNA tested and deterimed to be that of a coyote. In January 2008, a "dog-like" animal was seen killing chickens on a farm in the Phillipines and was declared to be, obviously, a Chupacabra and not a dog. In July 2010, a coyote-dog hybrid with mange was called a Chupacabra in Texas.
And now, we have this poor dead critter to add to the list, and it would be hilarious in its absurdity except I don't find dead critters funny.

Cothren was quoted by WAVE3, by way of POPFi: "I was like, ‘every animal has hair, especially this time of year!’ What puzzled me is how something like that could survive through a winter with no hair."

Well, it didn't survive the winter, sir - you shot and killed it.

Kangaroos in Kentucky?

One from my writing blog:


Readers of my Unusual Kentucky blog and my Weird Kentucky book already know the lowdown on anomalous Kangaroo sightings in the Commonwealth, but now I've hipped the Kentucky Monthly crowd to the concept in the latest installment of my Commonwealth Curiosities column! Check it out at your local newsstand or bookstore!

The Black Puma

There have been many reported sightings of so-called "black panthers" in Kentucky (and other states as well) despite the fact that they aren't supposed to be here. "Panther" is a generic term that refers to any number of large black cats in general, and if there really are black ones in our state, they are most likely rare melanistic colour mutation of any number of species.

According to Wikipedia:

"There are no authenticated cases of truly melanistic cougars (pumas). Melanistic cougars have never been photographed or shot in the wild and none has ever been bred. There is wide consensus among breeders and biologists that the animal does not exist."

However, it then immediately goes on to state:

"Black cougars have been reported in Kentucky and in the Carolinas."

The photo above is one such example.

On the other hand, black Bobcats, while also rare, are acknowledged to exist, and although they technically do not qualify as panthers, I don't think the average person who spots one is going to care about the finer distinctions.

Hyenas in Kentucky

Researcher Bart Nunnelly has reported of a couple of cases of hyenas in Kentucky. One was near Uniontown, and the other was spotted (no pun intended) near Lexington in 2004:

"About 10 feet in front of the car, on the grassy area next to the expressway, we saw a strange 'creature'. It looked like a hyena, bluish-gray fur with blackish spots or splotches. It was crouched down as if going to pounce. As our car passed it looked over at us. It's face had a snout and long teeth. It bared its teeth at us and we were so shocked we just drove on. I can't imagine what it was. It was about 3 feet tall at the shoulder with a sloping back and narrower haunches. Its head was big and it had a fur 'fringe' along its back."

I'm not sure why they say "I can't imagine what it was" if they just got through saying it looked like a hyena, but okay. And that's a lot of detail given from someone who saw it from a moving car.

We do know there are coyotes in Kentucky, and that sounds more believable than a hyena. Seen from a distance in a moving car, a dirty or splotchy-looking coyote could fit the description and be mistaken for a hyena, I suppose. See coyote photo below:


Two 2009 posts to Jeff and Claudia's blog speculate on wolf sightings. Wolves are increasingly common again in Kentucky, and have even been deliberately reintroduced in some areas. These, too, could easily be responsible for alleged hyena sightings. See Red Wolf and Gray Wolf photo below:



On the other hand, it's still not impossible that hyenas could have somehow entered Kentucky's environment, as escapees from zoos or private breeders. Stranger things have happened, after all, like the spate of kangaroo sightings in Kentucky in the 1970s.

Bigfoot Photographed in Fairdale?

Kenny Mahoney of Fairdale, KY, has inadvertently snapped a mysterious photograph that some people believe is a Bigfoot-type cryptid.

Mahoney operates a motion-detecting hunting camera, which usually picks up mundane critters such as deer, rabbits and possums. But recently his camera took a strange image that appears to be a gorilla, or something like one.

Hate to be a spoilsport, but the longer I stare at the image, the more it seems to me that the two blurry blobs that look like arms are actually large birds, and the blurry blob that appears to be its head and torso is just the general background of the dark woods. I'd like to see what other photos without the alleged Bigfoot, taken in this exact same spot, look like.

On the other hand, if there was a place where a Kentucky Bigfoot could thrive, it would indeed be near Fairdale, which is a community just a couple miles East of Penile. Check a map, and you'll see that inside the triangle formed by Fairdale, Kosmosdale, and Shepherdsville, there's a vast expanse of wilderness with very little civilization going on.


On the other hand, the Fairdale Bigfoot has a Facebook and a Twitter, so he must be real, right?

Weird Lizard of Madison County

The Kentucky Bigfoot cryptozoology website went so long without any updates that I'd just about given up on it... but lo and behold, I stuck my beak in there last night and found that a new sighting report had been filed back in February:

"I am a night time truck driver that goes down I 75 to williamsburg, ky. I believe I was south of Richmond, KY. I saw something next to the concrete barrier that divided the north and southbound interstate. I was on the southbound side. I thought at first it might be a rabibit, but this thing either jumped the highway or was so fast I didn't see it running. It crossed about 20ft. in front of my truck, easily getting to the other side and disapeared into the woods. I have never seen an animal like this before. I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

It looked like it didn't have any fur on it, looking like it was just grey skin. It to me looked like a small reptile or even a small dinosaur. It may have been a couple feet or so long. It looked like it had small dark eyes on the side of it's head. I also saw a long tail on this thing. It was very very fast and a normal animal I would have hit it, as I was going 65 in a 70 mile speed zone. It happened so fast I didn't notice if it had ears or not. It truly looked like something out of jurisic [sic] park."

Wait, what? Small reptile or even small dinosaur? Was it the Milton Lizard? Or the "Reptilian Wild Man" of 1878? Or William Branham's Biblical Serpent-Dude?

Giant Muskellunge

According to the new edition of the Kentucky Fishing and Boating Guide, a 14-year-old Mt. Sterling girl named Sarah Terry recently caught this record-breaking muskellunge (commonly called "muskies") in Cave Run Lake, Rowan County.

Northern Kentucky Monster Hunters

What do you make of this, Professor? I ran across this site while surfing the web.

I can't tell if it's a group of people who are genuinely delusional and living in a self-created online fantasy world, or are just role-playing game geeks. (Oh wait, is there a difference?)

Kangaroos in Kentucky

Kentucky Down Under is a nature preserve/theme park located in Horse Cave, KY (take exit 58 off I-65). Like Henry's Ark, it presents its visitors with the cognitive dissonance of seeing exotic animals roaming semi-openly (as opposed to a constrictive zoo-like environment).

Kangaroos are what Kentucky Down Under is best known for, but there are many other odd Aussie critters creeping around: Emus, Green Tree Pythons, Bettings, Kookaburras, Lorikeets, Swamp Wallabies, etc.

But wild Kangaroo sightings in Kentucky have occurred over the years as well.

In 1899 there was a spate of reports of wild Kangaroos being sighted all across North America, including in Northern Kentucky. I hate to invoke the debunker's term "mass hysteria", but in this case, surely a lot of people thinking they were seeing Kangaroos pop up simultaneous across the continent were mistaken (On the other hand, maybe it was just your standard run-of-the-mill quantum temporal timespace displacement vortex).

In 1974, Kangaroos were reported running wild in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky. There is apparently some truth to this flap, because the Kangaroos were reportedly photographed in Lansing, IL. Further verified sightings occured in 1978 in Wisconsin.

1878 Reptilian Wild Man

In the October 28, 1878 issue of the Courier-Journal, we find a story of a "Wild man of the Woods" being captured in the wilderness of Kentucky and placed on public display in downtown Louisville.

The mysterious humanoid creature was said to be over six feet tall, and possessing eyes twice as large as a human's. Try to picture that for just a moment - pretty horrifying if you think about it. What intrigues me most of all about the sketchy details of this news report, though, is that the monster-man in question purportedly had scales instead of skin.

Like so many Victorian-era news stories of the day, this one was treated rather matter-of-factly despite its outlandish subject matter, and was not followed up on in subsequent issues. Whatever became of this reptilian "wild man" is not known, and at this late date it's unlikely we'll ever know.

It's interesting to note, however, that the description of the lizard-man corresponds closely with paleontologist Dale Russell's theory of reptilian humanoids. (A model of his hypothetical "dinosauroid" is pictured above.)

Bigfoot twins in Baskett

In 1999, there was a report of a pair of Bigfoots (Bigfeet?) being seen in a field of beans close to Highway 60 in Baskett, KY. According to researcher Bart Nunnelly, "Both were brownish-gray in color and were positioned with their backs towards witness. One BF was squatting down,apparently doing something to the ground which was obscured by beans."

This incident illustrates well the "hidden in plain sight" axiom which applies to all paranormal phenomena: the person who reported the creatures noted that traffic was heavy that day, with lots of cars in front of him and behind him, and yet no one else bothered reporting the incident that day.

The Dry Ridge Monster

From the Kentucky Post, August 27, 2001:

In July 1964 things were hopping in Grant County. The annual county fair was about to start its four-day run on the grounds of Grant County High School. Among the events were horseshoe pitching, baby show, Miss Grant County competition, Junior Woman's Club variety show and flower show sponsored by the Carlsbad Garden Club.

Then ''it'' was seen.

''It'' was described as big, dark, about 7 feet tall with shiny eyes. ''It'' was seen at a trash dump off U.S. 36. With each pasing night, word spread of the monster. Carloads of people came out to try to catch a glimpse of the beast. Some people reported seeing bear-like footprints.

One local farmer said the crowds were a nuisance, ''shouting and shooting.'' He asked people to stay away, saying there was no monster.

Making headlines daily in The Kentucky Post, the matter turned serious when two 17-year-old boys were accidentally struck by shotgun pellets fired by a group of teen-agers hunting for the monster. The injuries were not life-threatening.

Meanwhile, police were receiving reports of other monster sightings.

Finally, officers speculated the ''monster'' was probably just an eccentric man, well known to police, who tended to wander around after dark, but who was apparently harmless.

They also announced plans to begin citing the carloads of people, many from Kenton and Campbell counties, who continued to show up for the monster hunts. One night officers chased away 14 carloads, many of which had people ''running around half-cocked with shotguns.''

The Milton Lizard

In the summer of 1975, a cryptid described as resembling a 15-foot monitor lizard was sighted multiple times at Canip Creek, near the town of Milton, in Trimble County. It's come to be known as the Milton Lizard, sometimes called the Canip Monster.

Clarence Cable, manager of the Blue Grass Body Shop, saw the hissing creature come out from behind some wrecked vehicles. Cable said it had "big eyes similar to a frog's... Beneath its mouth was an off-white color and there were black and white stripes cross ways of its body with quarter-sized speckles over it."

The lizard was described by Cable as having a long forked tongue and huge, bulging, froglike eyes. Its skin was said to be black and white striped, and with small speckles. After the concentrated flurry of sightings in 1975, it was never seen again, leaving Fortean researchers to wonder.

Some have theorized the Milton Lizard might have been a monitor lizard (pictured above) that somehow got released into Kentucky's ecosystem.

(The city of Milton's other claim to fame, incidentally, is that the Rat Pack film Some Came Running was filmed here.)

Mothman Sighting in Russell

These two photographs have been circulating the net for several months now, and are alleged to be a Mothman sighting on a bridge connecting Russell, KY and Ironton, OH.

I'm not buying it, for several reasons; not the least of which is that I just don't believe in the "Mothman" in the first place. I'm also troubled by the fact that the two jpgs are small and of different sizes (where are the originals?). And it sure is a coincidence that the Mothman is seen clinging to a bridge on the Ohio River, just as in its original alleged 1966 sighting. The photos are claimed to have been taken in the evening near dusk, yet the second photo of the "Mothman" leaving shows a considerably lighter sky - indicating that the photos were taken in the morning as the sun is rapidly rising.

Finally, the story that the couple who took these photos claim to have seen its red eyes glowing - even from that huge distance - is just plain silly.